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Old 29th December 2012
thirdm thirdm is offline
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Join Date: May 2009
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ocicat View Post
Most employers state in nondisclosure forms signed upon the first day of employment that any work done with company hardware or company time (or anything done during an employee's employment period...) becomes their property. I don't see this ever changing because ownership of intellectual property is often seen as providing a strategic competitive edge over competitors. Besides, legal departments want the rules to be clear in case they need grounds for suing or terminating employment.
This stronger claim you parenthetically allude to, that they'd try to grasp ownership on anything you do during your term of employment, strikes me as extraordinary. I know it exists, because the company I work for now re-wrote our terms to go almost that far. They were restrained somewhat by the fact that their home base is in California, which has a nice enlightened law (going way back to the 19th century, oddly enough) that limits such clauses only to the company's equipment and the portion of your day you're actively working for them, IIRC. Other U.S. states have no such laws as I understand it.

What's your experience been? Is this overreach into what we do in our own time on our own equipment becoming part of the standard employment contract most places push? It's crazy. Between things like this and having to pee in a cup for practically any large company, regardless of whether there's a real safety factor involved, it's like capitalists these days are begging for workers to keep an eye out for alternatives to what they have to offer.
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